


Reaching Back.

by withoutwords



Category: Hit the Floor (TV)
Genre: Angst, Bisexuality, Coming Out, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 19:31:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6091708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutwords/pseuds/withoutwords
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jude’s always liked the idea of normal. Zero’s still working out what that is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reaching Back.

**Author's Note:**

> Just to warn, outside of preview clips and a few things on Tumblr I haven’t seen the latest episode. This is set in the immediate future, so hopefully nothing clashes with what’s already aired :)
> 
> _“I keep reaching out to people…Just once, I want somebody to reach back.”_ – Jude.

It’s funny, how their story’s spun. A pretty weaving of something that doesn’t really hit the edges – like an old fairytale forgetting to mention Prince Charming was actually a reforming sleazeball. A playboy who might not deserve to kiss a frog let alone his best friend. It wasn’t pretty, or glossy, or worth putting in a magazine.

It was worth a lot more than that. It was _Zero’s_.

“Does this count as a date?”

Zero has a bowl of Cheerios and Jude’s drinking something mossy green and their backs are pressed against the sofa, legs tangled where they spread out. The room’s low lit and their phones are turned off and it’s about as romantic as they’ve gotten in the two weeks since Zero … whatever. _Came out_.

“Oh, absolutely,” Jude says, sarcasm thick and head back, peering at the TV. Zero likes to watch the pull of his throat, the promise of something else just under his now open collar. He likes to put his thumb there, too, and press just hard enough to feel a pulse. “Pay for my meal and give me a blowjob and I think we can call it a night.”

“You paid for that?” Zero protests, trying not to let Jude see him smile. He grabs at his drink to give it an exaggerated sniff. “It looks like you scraped it off a rock.”

“It looks like you’re in no place to judge,” Jude bites back, eyeing Zero’s cereal.

“It has grains! And … and _vitamins_.”

“You’re the worst,” Jude teases, taking back his drink and abandoning it in favour of coming up to straddle Zero’s lap. His weight is heavy, and warm, his skin so soft where Zero’s hands disappear up the back of his untucked shirt. He feels so familiar.

“The worst date?”

“The worst athlete,” Jude says in a low voice, tucking his face in and getting his fingers snagged in Zero’s hair. “Eat what you want, kiss who you want.”

“You better get me in line then, boss,” he mutters, his hands now on Jude’s ass and pulling him in. There are words he should say, he knows; how Jude’s the only person he wants to or will be kissing, how that means more than anything has since Jude brought him here to L.A. There are words, on his tongue and behind his teeth, and Jude’s kissing them gone, swallowing them down, keeping them safe.

Jude knows.

*

They get awesome FroYo on Hillhurst, and buy Jude a new shirt when he spills it. They see a movie and get coffee and do a really bad job of trying to sneak into a _Lakers_ game. They have fun, amongst the rest of it – the looks and the words and the endless pressure to be something Zero isn’t ready to be. A poster child, maybe – an idol for the kids struggling with who they are, and how that never seems to measure up to what they want to be.

That’s not Zero. That’s not even Gideon.

“ _This_ is a date,” Zero tells Jude when they’re tucked into a quiet corner of a restaurant that probably hasn’t seen new furniture this decade. Jude’s wearing dark grey and his hair’s getting longer, slicked back, and Zero wishes it were easier, to show him off. To take him out and be proud and let people see, yeah, he’s mine.

“I guess it qualifies,” Jude says with a teasing shrug, taking a sip of his water. He throws Zero a look he’s seeing so much now. A looks that reminds Zero of the bitter spit of Lucas’ words - _needy and neurotic_ \- like that was a bad thing, to be needed. Needed in a way that’s different to anything else, different to the benefit checks and basketball games and scheming ways to the top. Needed so personally, so intimately, that you were suddenly indispensable.

Suddenly loved.

“I drove here. I opened the door,” Zero points out. “Didn’t I take your coat?”

“I hope I get that back,” Jude mutters, turning his head to look around to the service desk. “The guy behind the counter was eyeing it off.”

It takes a moment for Zero to realise he’s serious, and he laughs. “He was eyeing you off, idiot, not your coat.”

Jude scoffs. “While I was standing next to _you_? Sure.”

“Don’t do that,” Zero says with a small shake of his head, but he’s smiling. “You’re sexy, Jude. You’re _desirable_.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know you are I just – it’s not easy to hear that stuff. I mean it’s nice it’s just - ”

“Hey, I’m just being a good date,” Zero says with a little shrug, sloping along his chair. He likes the way Jude’s eyes travel up along his torso. How he’s still full of lust, and want, after all this time. After everything. “I mean I could tell you you’re a lousy cook and can’t sing a note to save your life, but - ”

“Yeah, yeah, okay.”

“But I’m an awesome date,” he finishes. “Admit it.”

“I think I’m going to need a bigger sample group,” Jude says, resting on his elbows. “You know, more dates so I can make a rational decision on whether you are as awesome as you think you are.”

“Oh, really? How big?”

“Preferably an infinite number,” Jude says, and his eyes aren’t so playful now. He almost looks hopeful, and coy. “If that’s okay with you.”

Zero leans forward too. Their hands entwine. “I think we can work something out.” 

*

Jude’s always liked the idea of normal. Zero’s still working out what that is. It’s not normal to be abandoned, or abused; it’s not normal to grade your own value on how many people you can sleep with at one time. Or how many people you can play against each other. 

It’s not normal to use God for your own gain, or misquote Bible verses like they’re required reading and you’re trying not to fail the test. (It’s not normal to see life as a test at all.)

They’re _not_ normal – they’re not fairytale princes – but who is? Who wants to be?

“What’s going on?” Jude mutters sleepily at Zero, who’s perched on the edge of the bed. The clock says 3:24AM, but his whole body buzzes, he’s wired.

“I can’t sleep.”

“Okay.”

“You want to go on a date?” he asks, without even thinking. They’ve barely seen each other in the last week – if Zero had thought letting the world know he was bisexual was going to be his only excitement for the year, he was wrong. Between Jelena, and Derek, and Oscar’s return, he was knee deep in so much shit that coming out felt like a holiday.

“A date? Where? IHOP?”

“Why not?”

“Zero, come on,” Jude says in that annoyingly astute way that makes Zero turn his back again. “What’s going on?”

“I just – it feels like I’m not doing this right.”

Zero feels the bed dip as Jude scoots over. He’s so warm at Zero’s back, his mouth dry where he presses it against Zero’s shoulder and hand firm where it’s curled around the other. “There’s no rules, you know. Everyone’s story is different. It’s up to you how it’s told.”

“I’m not talking about my story. I’m talking about this.”

“This?” Jude’s hand tightens. “This - us?”

“Us,” Zero concedes and then turns, and then grips at his arms. “Tell me – you know this wasn’t a stunt right?”

“Of course – we’ve talked about this.”

They have. Repeatedly. In stereo. Zero’s tried so hard to make Jude understand that he started to forget who he was trying to convince. The lines between Zero the name, the number, the player, the man – they were only ever clear when he was with Jude. He had to keep reminding himself. He had to keep hold of the things that were real. _Normal_.

“Yeah but – I don’t – I didn’t kiss you because it served a purpose or because I got more coverage or - ”

“I know. I know that and I know you so don’t – stop acting like I got some raw deal here.” Jude shifts so that he’s sitting up more, pinning Zero with a determined look. “You know what I’ve done – the things I have done to get to where I am - ”

“Oscar - ”

“Yeah,” Jude says with a sigh. “We both have scars to bear on that score, don’t we? It’s not about what we’ve done, it’s about what we’re doing. And – and this is the best thing I’ve ever done.”

Zero feels the words like water, like they’re filling him up. He presses his forehead against Jude’s and whispers, “Me too,” because it’s the truth. And he’s only ever told Jude the truth. When they kiss it’s not urgent. It’s not desperate, or wanting. They just settle against each other.

Zero grins.

“I still wanna go get pancakes.”

*

Zero loves to fuck. Once he got out of the system, got out from under the thumb of every foster family, or government swine, or teacher trying to tell him that he wasn’t going to get anywhere if all he had in life was sport – once he was free of that he was free for anything. Free to go out and dance and drink and meet people and fuck. Free to enjoy the way people looked at him, or touched him, or wanted him. Free to want it back, and love it.

He just didn’t want _more_ until Jude.

They fucked a lot. The quick, frantic kind of sex that was usually by the front door, or in the locker room, or at midnight when Zero had gotten home from a game with his whole body wound tight with adrenaline. They liked to hold each other down, bite and bruise and feel the rough glide of sweat and stubble and hair. It was animalistic and addictive and even if Zero couldn’t say it was the best sex he’d ever had Jude was definitely the best person he’d ever had it with.

Which meant a lot more, in the end.

“Zero,” Jude’s saying around a breath, leg muscles shuddering under Zero’s hands as he lowers himself onto Zero’s dick. It’s slick and slow and torturous; Jude’s eyes are closed as he bites on his bottom lip, tempting Zero further, testing his control.

This isn’t fucking. They’d kissed until Zero’s mouth went numb, until all that was left between them were Zero’s threadbare briefs and a tube of KY. He’d gotten Jude ready, his knees up and his breaths rapid and that small shrill noise that usually meant he was flirting with the edge.

“Fuck, Jude,” Zero encourages, his hands at Jude’s hips and holding him down, just trying to find a better rhythm. Trying to find some solid ground. Jude clenches tight around him, that warm, crashing feeling hitting at his balls, and Jude’s saying,

“Let me, I gotta,” holding onto the headboard and moving up to find a better angle. 

Zero takes in the sight of Jude, the lines and curves and expanse of him, the way he feels so solid and real and alive. Every hair on Zero’s body is on end, shivering, pulsing up and pulling down and bringing Jude in enough to kiss him with a lazy, open mouth.

This isn’t fucking because fucking is simple and nothing about the way Jude makes him feel is simple.

“Jesus, _Gideon_ ,” Jude says, like he does sometimes, and Zero runs a hand through his hair, pushing it back. They find a rhythm and a pace that brings them right up to the surface; crying out and catching breaths and somehow still drowning. Jude comes first with a few desperate strokes of his cock, and then he’s urging Zero to keep going, Zero flipping him onto his back to take over.

It doesn’t take much. The hot swell of Jude’s ass, the wanton, half dazed look he’s giving Zero, the way he mutters, _come on, come for me, fuck_.

He’s not quiet when he’s done, and he knows Jude prefers it that way.

“I was supposed to take you out,” he says once he’s pulled out and cleaned up and gathered Jude close to him.

“You kinda did,” Jude says with a laugh, and his eyes are closed like he’s tempted to sleep.

Zero doesn’t hide his swell of pride. “I meant on a date.”

“Where to?”

“I was thinking _Paru’s_ on Sunset.”

“Indian?”

“Yeah? And?”

Jude laughs again and curls in close, his hand resting on Zero’s chest. “Nothing. Sounds good.”

Zero plays with Jude’s fingers for a while, twisting them in his own, bringing them to his mouth. “You called me Gideon,” he says quietly, when their breathing and their bodies have evened out. Jude doesn’t answer him. He’s asleep. “I am. I am when I’m with you.”

*

After more than a month of questioning, Zero finally sits down with _The Advocate_. It’s just a coffee in some hipster bar a few blocks from the training centre and although Jude had offered to go with him Zero had felt like that was a cop out. It wasn’t an interview about their relationship. Not completely.

“So, Zero,” the journalist says, offering him a gentle smile as she sets her recorder onto the table. Her smooth, dark skin is stark against the baby blue of her blouse and she’s beautiful. If this were another time, another world maybe, he’d put all his cocky guards up and flirt with her, make this easy. As it is. “You’ve been doing a lot of press lately.”

“Oh, you noticed that too?”

“I did, I did. I also noticed you’ve been very tight lipped about your sexuality.”

“Well,” Zero says, clearing his throat. “Let’s cut to the chase.”

“I thought you might prefer that.”

“Well, yeah,” Zero says with a small shrug, because as much as it pains him to admit it, she’s right. He doesn’t want any of the fluff. The romance and the self actualisation and trying to find a name for himself. A label. He just wanted people to understand he wasn’t ashamed. The rest they could work out on their own. “I guess you’re right.”

Simone’s good at what she does. Zero finds himself saying things he hadn’t planned to, on more than one occasion – but he figures that’s how this whole thing got started. Because he was spontaneous, reckless even. And that paid off in the end.

“What would you say to people who think your kiss with Jude was just a publicity stunt?”

Zero huffs out a laugh. “I’d tell them to come see how my life’s been, and then say it to my face.”

“You regret the kiss?”

“No,” Zero says fiercely because he said that once. He made that mistake. He won’t do it again. “I regret that I didn’t do this first. I should have sat down and talked it out and then – then made the grand gesture.”

“But you got something out of it, right?” Simone asks with a sly smile, because she’s read the tabloids. She knows the things Zero hasn’t denied. 

“Yeah,” he admits. The only thing he’d wanted. “I got Jude.”

*

Zero’s had few thrills in his life. Outside of Jude there’s basketball – there’s victory – and outside of that there’s probably nothing. He hasn’t had a real friend since high school; hasn’t been to far off places or seen any wonders of the world. Some of the greatest thrills in his life – if he’s honest – have been from beating people at their own game. Belittling and demeaning people that he’s hated because he couldn’t for so long, because he was no longer powerless.

He used to think control was the only thing worth fighting for.

“Hey,” Jude says one night when Zero’s getting in from training. He’s wearing a nice shirt, open at the collar, and he’s leaning against the wall with a hand in his pocket and the other playing at his bottom lip. Zero’s sweaty, he smells, he thinks he’s got grimy court dirt all over him – and yet Jude is still flooring him with that look.

“What’s going on?”

“Go get ready. We’re going out.”

“Well it’s nice to see you too, Jude,” Zero says, sarcastic, dumping his bag and sitting down to peel off his shoes. He keeps stealing glances at Jude, like he’s waiting for something to happen; for fireworks, or a string quartet or, Jesus, who knows? Jude getting down on one knee?

“There’s a car waiting out the front, so be quick,” Jude finally says, pushing off the wall to head for the front door. Zero throws a look at him, over his shoulder, appraising how great his ass looks in those pants. He’d rather just say home.

“A car?”

“I may have … misappropriated one of the team’s drivers.”

Zero stands up. “Isn’t that a fancy word for stolen?”

“Go.”

“Where are we going?”

“ _Zero_ ,” Jude says, throwing his head back, and Zero thinks his pestering was worth it just for that look. He laughs, and throws up his hands. He was going to shower any way, there’s no real point to his arguing.

“Okay, okay. Jesus. Give you a little power and you go crazy.”

There’s not a lot of dialogue in the car, because Jude doesn’t want him to know where they’re headed. He asks how Zero’s day’s been in that low, seductive voice, starts kissing at his neck when Zero refuses to change the subject. It’s so blissfully calm, just giving himself over, and by the time they reach where they’re going Zero already feels like he’s drunk.

“We’re at the Drive-In?” he asks blearily, disbelievingly, because really? He’d imagined – God, he’d imagined a jet, or a rooftop or _steak_. 

“Uh huh.”

It’s the most ridiculous thing he’s ever seen. Jude gets out a blanket and a basket – _“No, I didn’t cook it, shut up,”_ – and then takes out some beers, and if there was ever a time Zero wished he’d paid attention to _Grease_ this was it, just so he could tease Jude.

“Am I your Sandy?” he says anyway, as they settle onto the ground. He’s laughing. A lot. “I’m your Sandy aren’t I?”

“Are you done?”

The food’s really good – there’s no doubt Jude’s had it made – and the drinks are good quality. They’re Zero’s favourite. There’s a gentle hum, like waves, across the crowd and the lights go down as the usual advertisements begin. The night air is crisp, but Jude’s blocking a lot of it, and Zero finds himself taking a deep, steadying breath. His first real one for the day. 

“I used to come here, a lot,” Jude suddenly says, quietly, his feet crossed at the ankles and playing with a strawberry. “You know, back when – when things were crazy and I, I had no one.”

“Look, Jude, I’m - ” Zero starts, feeling suddenly guilty.

“It just,” Jude cuts in, and he’s giving Zero one of those smiles he reserves for the big moments. The smile that says, I’m with you, we’re in this together, I’m team Zero. “It feels like home, and – and I don’t want to know any home without you. Not any more.”

Zero's suddenly hyper-aware of everything happening to him. And it's a thrill, in its own way, not just to be with Jude or to keep Jude, but to trust other people with his happiness. He leans in to kiss Jude gently, hoping that his smile conveys half as much as Jude’s does. “It’s perfect.”

*

_Zero presses a sweet kiss to my cheek and says thank you for my time. He leaves enough money for our meals, and a generous tip, and waves goodbye to the bartender. When he’s gone - and all that’s left is a tape recording and the notes I hope I can decipher – I realise I need people to understand something important._

_“Jude once told me I made him feel normal,” Zero had said earlier, with that same reluctant blush he’d had every time he mentioned the other man. “Which never made sense before now, really. He didn’t mean normal, like – like husband and wife and kids and a dog he meant normal like. I understood him and he understood me and it was normal to want that, you know? It’s normal to love someone in spite of their gender.”_

_I need people to understand that aside from his talents, and his courage, Zero is just a man in love with another man._

_And that when you wipe off all that Hollywood shine, it’s still a wonderful story._

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr.](http://thefancyspin.tumblr.com)


End file.
